Jim DeRogatis

Born in Jersey City, New Jersey, the year the Beatles arrived in America, Jim DeRogatis began voicing his opinions about rock ’n’ roll shortly thereafter. He is a full-time lecturer in the Professional Writing Program of the English Department at Columbia College Chicago and continues to write about popular music for WBEZ Chicago at its Vocalo blogs. Together with Greg Kot of The Chicago Tribune, he co-hosts “Sound Opinions” —“the world’s only rock ’n’ roll talk show”—originating at WBEZ and distributed nationally on public radio via PRX.

DeRogatis spent 15 years as the rock critic at The Chicago Sun-Times and is the author of several books about music: "Let It Blurt: The Life and Times of Lester Bangs, America’s Greatest Rock Critic;" "The Velvet Underground: An Illustrated History of a Walk on the Wild Side;" "Staring at Sound: The True Story of Oklahoma’s Fabulous Flaming Lips;" "Turn On Your Mind: Four Decades of Great Psychedelic Rock," and "Milk It! Collected Musings on the Alternative Music Explosion of the ’90s." Outside of the musical realm, he published "Sheperd Paine: The Life and Work of a Master Modeler and Military Historian" in 2008, and in 2010, he and Kot issued their first book together, "The Beatles vs. the Rolling Stones: Sound Opinions on the Great Rock ’n’ Roll Rivalry," written in the fun but combative style of the radio show.

DeRo has played in punk-rock bands since age 13 but jokes that he is a drummer, not a musician. He lives on the North Side of Chicago with his wife Carmel (with whom he edited the 2004 anthology "Kill Your Idols: A New Generation of Rock Writers Reconsiders the Classics"), near their daughter Melody.

Recent stories by this author

AUSTIN, TX—With 2,000 bands traveling from across the country and around the world to perform at South by Southwest, one question that always hangs over these proceedings is how many of them ever will find it possible to support themselves solely by their music.Now more than ever, post-digital

AUSTIN, TX—Unlike many (most?) of the journalists who cover the South by Southwest Music Festival, Greg Kot and I generally skip the daytime parties—which may be fewer this year, but still are myriad—in favor of covering the panels at the Austin Convention Center, which often offer

AUSTIN, TX—If South by Southwest 2014 was the saddest in the 28-year history of this cornerstone event for the music industry—as much for the corporate soul-sucking and horrible overcrowding as for the tragic and fatal car accident—2015 promises to be an attempt to scale back a bit

The occasional and exceptional celebration of a Patricia Arquette aside, popular culture’s tendency to discount female artists once they hit the second third of their lives and careers is despicable, and it leads to missing far too much great art.